A goal of computer-generated graphics and animations is increased realism, especially of characters. Characters, especially human characters, are often animated wearing snugly fitting clothing, which would physically stretch and form wrinkles in response to body motions. Animating such deformations may be computationally intensive, as a mesh (the vertices and connecting edges) for animating the clothing can be quite large, and the physical effects of a garment's motion are not necessarily localized. For example, raising an arm inside a sweater can cause a wrinkle across the entire front of the sweater.
Simulating a single image of deformations of cloth, especially clothing on a character, at high levels of realism and detail can be performed, but with high computational cost. The level of detail required to achieve realism may entail very large systems of equations resulting from the size of a mesh that models the clothing or surface. Generating animations of a moving character would entail even greater computational costs.
Methods and systems are needed that reduce the computational time and costs of producing animation data for deformable surfaces, such as clothing overlaying an animated character, while maintaining high levels of realism.